[NEWS] Jesse Eisenberg cast as Lex Luthor and Jeremy Irons as Alfred

There are a few legitimately interesting news coming from the sequel to "Man of Steel", which really ought to be named properly at some point. It's shock after shock with this thing, though that's not necessarily a bad thing.

So, after learning that Batman and then Wonder Woman would be in this, with rumours of more Justice League members making at least an appearance, after Ben-frigging-Affleck cast as the Dark Knight, we now finally have two more names added to the cast.

Jeremy Irons, a talented and distinguished actor, is Alfred Pennyworth, Batman's trusted butler and surrogate father figure. Irons is a fantastic actor, but he never sold me as a normal, seemingly mild-mannered butler. That's not a complaint, I'm merely wondering whether or not they'll take another direction for the character, particularly the one from "Batman: Earth One", where Alfred was a trained and active English Secret Service agent before taking over custody of young Bruce.

Of course the one everyone's been talking about is Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor. People have lost their collective shit over this. Common complaints are common: he looks too young, he's skinny, he just doesn't look the part.

All of the aforementioned complaints are, naturally, absolute bollocks and they are all a diversion from the real protest:

"He's not Bryan Cranston"

Listen to me: I like Bryan Cranston and he would be a perfect Lex Luthor, but get over yourselves you entitled little dip-shits. I think Jon Hamm should've been Superman, it didn't happen. How can you realistically have a problem with this? Not seeing Lex in him right now I get, but are you really telling me that a talented, Academy Award, Golden Globes and BAFTA (among others)- nominated actor will not be able to pull off a role?

You do realize that's kind of how acting works, right? You don't need to have seen these people in similar roles before, you need to let them do their jobs, especially when they have proved that they have to skills. 


By the by, opinions respected and all that PC-bullshit, but at what point exactly did you start thinking that actors, especially skilled actors, require your permission to stretch their abilities and progress their careers and take it in new and interesting directions?

Get over yourselves; about Eisenberg, about Gadot (as Wonder Woman), about Affleck. The casting directors definitely have a better idea what they're doing than you and Warner is riding far, far too much on this entire project to take chances.

Fan-manip of Eisenberg as Lex Luthor. Looks fine to me!

Which leads to another point entirely; the entire branding for this movie has changed. "Man of Steel", love it or hate it, was promoted a very particular way. There was an idea, there was a vision, but most of all there was a desperate need to make it work financially and in terms of popularity. Especially considering that the legal dispute between DC Comics and the Jerry Siegel estate left the property in jeopardy, Warner had to release a new movie by the end of 2013 to maintain the rights to the character.

So "Man of Steel" had to play it safe, if not in terms of the actual material (which took chances with a lot of its plot and story decisions), then definitely in terms of promoting it. So, it was branded as the "realistic" approach to Superman, piggy-backing on the success of the Dark Knight Trilogy, with the names of Christopher Nolan and David Goyer all over the trailers and press releases.

The new film has changed entirely. Not only is it no longer a solo-Superman movie, but the driving forces behind it are promoting it differently as well.

The earlier fast-tracking has been stopped. The film has been delayed a whole year, to find a release spot that won't be challenged (particularly by Marvel), which will also undoubtedly give time to polish the film and its inescapable DC Cinematic Universe continuations.

Then, Nolan seems entirely absent from the more recent press-releases. The big name they sold "Man of Steel" on is gone, which actually makes sense considering he was mostly in a supervisory position during the first film as well. Then Goyer is no longer the head-writer; he's credited for the story, but the script is actually penned (or at least re-written and polished) by Chris Terrio, who recently won an Oscar for his screenplay of Affleck's "Argo".

That in itself is pretty big for two reasons: for one, the main problem with "Man of Steel", the terrible script that dragged down the entire film, is (probably) out of the picture now with a much better writer tending to it. Secondly, it points to a thought everybody had since Affleck was announced as Batman: he was chosen not just as a good fit for Snyder's vision of Batman in this series, but also for his connections with talent as a director. He will likely bring people he has worked with on board and he may even helm the directing duties himself in one of these movies (be it the upcoming Batman films or even Justice League).

Finally, one small interesting note is that DC's very own Geoff Johns is now listed as a producer. I was never a huge fan of Johns' work, particularly on Superman titles, but one can't deny the dude has good knowledge of and grasp on the characters and the source material.

For all intends and purposes, it seems "Batman VS Superman" and whatever films follow are taking a different direction. They're branded as huge projects with Academy Award prestige and will probably take a more light-hearted, more comic-book-like approach with the gravitas of big names and multi-million-dollar production values.

I liked "Man of Steel" a lot, but it was a deeply flawed (if not fundamentally broken) film. If it was merely a jumping off point for better things to come, colour me very intrigued and hopeful for the future of Warner's super-hero blockbusters.